Constriction
Breathless
Tense
Tight
Afraid
Holding Back
Heels dug into the dirt
Avoidance
Dragging
These are some of the feelings that I experience daily as a mother
At least that is the way I have seen it up until recently
A more accurate way to say this is actually:
These are the feelings and sensations I have felt most of the time about LIFE for as long as I can remember.
It's so easy to make them about motherhood and to believe a really complicated and personal story about postpartum depression or postpartum anxiety.
Those stories make us feel a bit more in control
They give us a neat and clean explanation
And much to the mind's delight they give us a reason to stay small and safe
To not do anything too new or exciting
But really, those feelings have nothing to do with PPD or PPA
In reality, those feelings have always been there about something -
About school, about social interactions, about marriage, about in-laws, and now about motherhood.
I'm just used to feeling tight and constricted
To feeling that desperate sensation of "I am deeply inadequate, and I need to think really hard about my next word or next move so I don't blow this whole thing up."
And my mind has always been there telling a story and pretending that if I just tried hard enough (aka MORE tension) that the feelings would go away
So this tension
This tightness
So often it feels like a solid rock that I am running up against.
Like an illusory cage that keeps me from living the life I want to live
But in reality, it isn't solid
It's as insubstantial as fairy dust.
There is only one thing needed to move the tension, to blast the rock into a thousand shiny pieces
A breath
One deep magical ethereal breath
It lets go; it dissolves tightness and tension.
It circulates energy through the whole beautiful body and out into the real world instead of keeping it trapped, stagnant, and racing in circles in the mental space
In reality, all I have to do is take a deep breath and blow and the fairy dust cage disappears into the breeze
It might come back the next minute
And that is just fine
Because I know that it is moving, shifting, impermanent, impersonal
It isn't me.
So go ahead.
Take a deep breath
Blow.
Photo by Christopher Campbell on Unsplash